Math

Math Blast (not to be confused with Math Blaster) is an iPad app that elementary school students can use to practice basic mathematics skills. Students answer math problems in order to navigate their rocket ships and earn points. As students earn more points, their rockets gain power to move through the game scenes more quickly.

The Math Blast app offers two modes for students to use. Level mode presents students with progressively more difficult math problems as they move through the game. Custom mode allows students to select a skill to practice. In the custom mode students select a skill (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division) and a range of numbers that will appear in the practice exercises.

Last week OpenEd.io released an Android app called Common Core Quest. This week they have released the same excellent app on the iOS platform. Common Core Quest is a free iPad and iPhone app. The free app gives students access to hundreds of practice quizzes aligned to Common Core standards in math and language arts. Before and after taking a quiz students can watch short video lessons that address the skills needed to master the standards contained in the quizzes.

To use Common Core Quest a student selects his or her grade then selects the math or language arts standards he or she is working toward mastering. (Teachers will probably have to provide directions to students and their parents as to which standards they should be working toward). The student will earn digital badges when he or she shows mastery of a standard through quiz scores.

Common Core Quest currently contains activities for every middle school and high school Common Core math and language arts standard. Coverage of elementary school standards is being added (currently about half of the standards are included). A student can invite his or her teacher to view the progress that he or she is making toward each goal in Common Core Quest. Students can invite teacher either by email or by class code if the teacher has created a class account on OpenEd.io.

Zap Zap Fractions is a fun and free iPad app designed to help elementary school students learn about fractions. The app contains clear narrated visual lessons about the basics of fractions. After completing the lessons students can test their skills in recognizing fractions by playing the Zap Zap games. The games present students with a series of visuals that represent a fraction. Students have to select the correct fraction to “zap” the oncoming obstacles in the game.

The lessons in Zap Zap Fractions are rather basic. For more robust lessons you may want to have your students download Fractions Basics. Fractions Basics offers lessons on adding and subtracting fractions, equivalent fractions, and improper and mixed fractions.

Curious Ruler is a neat iPad app for measuring objects. The purpose of the app is to provide comparisons between common objects like coins (US, Canadian, and Euros) and the object that a student measures.

To use Curious Ruler students select an object from the menu of comparison objects. The list of comparison objects includes coins, basketballs, and iPads. Students then use the camera on their iPads to snap a picture of an object. For example I took a picture of my mouse and learned that an iPad was 2.5 times its size.

Curious Ruler isn’t the most robust app that you’ll find in the App Store and your students could do similar things with physical objects. That said, the use of Curious Ruler would be for students to check their answers after physically measuring and making comparisons.

Desmos is a free graphing calculator that originally launched a few years ago as a web app before becoming an iPad app (the web app still works too). Recently, the Desmos iOS app was updated with some good features for students. First, Desmos is now properly formatted to work in landscape and portrait mode on iPads and iPhones. Second, you can now take pictures with the app to insert them into your graphs. Third, and most important to me and first-time uses of the app, a guided tour of the app’s features are now built into the app.

In many cases using Desmos is a good alternative to purchasing expensive TI-84 Plus (or whatever the latest model is) calculators. If your school has a 1:1 program with laptops or iPads you can use Desmos in any classroom.